WEST SPRINGFIELD - The Board of Health Wednesday agreed in principle to ban cigarette sales in any health care institution, including pharmacies or retail establishments with pharmacies, as part of a package of proposed regulations governing nicotine products.

The three-member board took that action following an approximately one-hour public hearing during which a representative of F.L. Roberts spoke in opposition. Board members agreed to send the package to the town attorney’s office for review for legal form.

They also agreed to change a section banning the sale of electronic cigarettes in the city by amending it to allow sales of such cigarettes if they are approved at some future date by the federal Food and Drug Administration. There are currently no federal regulations governing manufacture of the devices, which were originally marketed as aids to stop smoking.

Also part of the package are provisions to ban the sales of cigar blunts, nonresidential roll-your-own machines, free distribution of nicotine products, sales of tobacco in post-secondary institutions and coupons that would allow sale of cigarettes below that state’s minimum price.

The proposed regulations, slated to take effect April 1, allow for fines of from $100 to $300 as well as suspension of sales of tobacco and nicotine delivery products for 30 consecutive days. The package also calls for limiting permits for selling tobacco permits to 60. There are fewer than 50 such establishments currently doing business in the city.

Ray Cross, district manager for F.L. Roberts’ Springfield office expressed opposition to banning cigarette sales in pharmacies as well as sales of electronic cigarette.

“You are dictating to a retailer what they can sell for product,” Cross said of the pharmacy provision.

Electronic cigarettes are less harmful than tobacco cigarettes and have helped people quit smoking, according to Cross.

Noting that there is an obesity problem in this country, Cross said, “What’s next? The whole Frito Lay sales rack?”

The Massachusetts Food Association, the trade organization in the state for grocery stores and supermarkets, wrote a letter to Health Director Jeanne M. Galloway opposing the tobacco ban in pharmacies and stores that have them.

The National Association of Tobacco Outlets submitted a letter dated Dec. 18 challenging statistics about smoking in the proposed package. Contentions in that letter were countered in a Dec. 19 letter from Cheryl Sbarra, senior staff attorney with the Tobacco Cessation and Prevention and Chronic Disease Prevention Program of the Massachusetts Association of Health Boards.

“As a practicing pediatrician I happen to know smoking is rampant among our young ones,” Board of Health member Dr. Angel L. Morales said.
Any contention otherwise, is “malarkey,” the physician said.

“We draw the line at minors and people not of legal age,” Board of Health Chairman Gerald W. Stadnicki said in reference to society regulating alcohol and tobacco.

Boston, Worcester and Springfield are among the cities in the commonwealth that have banned cigarette sales in pharmacies or establishments that have them.